Page:Lancashire Legends, Traditions, Pageants, Sports, Etc., with an Appendix Containing a Rare Tract.djvu/313



Had you but miss't that place you would Have done me no mischief. Then his head he shak't, Trembled and quaik't, And down he layed, and cried; First on one knee, Then on back tumbled he, So groaned, kick't, burst, and dyed.

OSBALDESTON HALL. origin of this ancient structure dates from Saxon times. It was evidently the home of Oswald; for this is merely another form of the name, and ton designates the homestead on his estate. This family does not appear to have been dispossessed by the Normans, the county was then perhaps too wild and uncultivated to be attractive to the conquerors; and hence we find Eilfi of Osbaldeston, a Saxon, living in the twelfth century, who had a son whose name appears in documents about 1245. The property continued in the family without interruption until 1701, when it passed into collateral lines on the death of Thomas, son of Edward Osbaldeston, the last male heir of his race. During the Tudor and early Stuart sovereigns the Osbaldestons formed one of the most distinguished families in the county; several of its members received the honour of knighthood, and one of them was connected by marriage with the Earls of Derby. They founded a Chantry in the parish church of Blackburn, and until recently a brass plate in the family chapel contained the figure of a man in armour, underneath which was the following inscription—"Here lyeth the bodye